‘Being targeted for pro-reservation stand’: IAS officer-turned-actor reacts amid questions over disability claim
Abhishek Singh finds himself in controversy at a time when trainee IAS Puja Khedkar has been accused of submitting ‘fake’ disability certificates for the job.
Amid claims that Puja Khedkar, a trainee IAS officer in Maharashtra, submitted ‘fake’ disability certificates to get the job, bureaucrat-turned-actor Abhishek Singh, facing similar allegations, has now responded, saying that he is being targeted due to his pro-reservation stand, and because he does so despite being from the general category.
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Singh, a 2011-batch IAS officer who resigned last year to become an actor, is under fire also over his dance and gym videos. He took to social media platform X (formerly Twitter) to answer his critics.
“Although criticism does not affect me, I am responding for the first time. And I am doing this because thousands of my supporters told me that I must not remain silent or this will break their morale. Therefore, it is my moral duty to present the truth so that their faith does not break. I dedicate this response to my followers…it is not for the critics,” he wrote on the microblogging website.
“Ever since I began speaking in favour of reservation, the anti-reservationists have not been able to digest that a person from the general category supports the policy. First they questioned my caste, then they said that I wanted my job back, and now they are saying that I became an IAS officer due to reservation,” Singh added.
Stating that he did all his social work through his own initiatives such as United by Blood and the No-Shame movement, and without any help from the government, the former bureaucrat argued that reservation should be given in government jobs on the basis of population.
“I move on the strength of my talent, confidence, and courage, and not on anyone's favour,” he posted.
Abhishek Singh claimed locomotor disability to avail concessions in the selection process undertaken by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC).